Legacy of M (X-Men/Worm Crossover, Post GM)

[Storm0fcrows]

Magneto is dead. The sanctuary he built destroyed, his hope for a better world shattered his kingdom burnt to ashes. Taylor Hebert knows none of this, the world she is on is not her own… but nature abhors a vacuum and the King is Dead. Long live the Queen.Pre House Of M. Post GM. New Power Taylor
-X-

ReGenesis 1.1

'I deserve peace.'

That thought anchored me to what remained of myself as I fell through the infinite gap between Earths. I don't remember peace… I can recall small victories before continuing on to the next battle. My memories were an unending loop of battle, betrayal, and blood. Lung, Bakuda, Jack, Coil, Echidna, Shadow Stalker, Alexandria, Tagg, Armsmaster, Dragon, Eidolon. Saint, Teacher, … Contessa. Conflict came easy; plans and strategies came to me, as smoothly as walking but after years of it part of me just wanted a moment to put down my weapon and stop fighting the monsters that sprung up from the woodwork.

But even with nothing else to do besides fall peace didn't find because I wasn't sure what if what was left of me could be considered Taylor Hebert. I definitely wasn't the scared girl facing off against a literal dragon to save some children, nor was I the guardian warlord of a city on the brink of collapse. I wasn't like the killer of would be tyrants or the slayer of Alexandria. I didn't feel like the heroic Weaver or villainous Skitter… or that thing I became to save the world.

Those personas felt like shells that needed to be discarded to become the woman that I was now… 'But who is that?' Mom had this movie she loved to watch, one of the few she would actively compare to literary classics, about a cyborg. There was a bunch of stuff that didn't really make much sense to me, either due to the age I watched it or because it had been years since I laid eyes on the tape, but those final words of the film felt exceedingly relevant as I descended into what could only be my death.

"When I was a child, I spoke as a child. I understood as a child, I thought as a child. But when I became a man, I put away childish things."

Those words of rebirth stayed with me and in a sense, they somehow defined what I was at that very moment just another shell that would eventually be cast off when it becomes too constricting.

…Like a beetle.

Khepri

I would have shuddered if I weren't so tired of everything. Contessa's final gift to me was a name for the creature, no, the weapon that she and the singer designed. The identities of people I knew for years, friends, were stripped to powers and how useful they would be in starting, prolonging, and ending conflict. All that remained of my life were enemies and those that she had caused pain… potential threats.

But they didn't matter anymore because I was falling and they were either dead or they couldn't reach me as I fell through the gap.

There are only so many ways that I could describe falling. There was that horrible weightlessness that hits you when you miss a step, the endless fear of eventually hitting the ground, and the acceptance that came with it. When I awoke in the absolute darkness, I was already falling but there was less of me then that there would be later… that is to say that I wasn't completely aware of the world around me. Drifting in and out of focus without an accurate way to measure time really skews with perception but then again so does exhaustion.

'I really deserve peace.'

-X-

There was once a small caravan of Rom that had settled in the outskirts of a small town in Nova Pazar. The caravan had four Vardo, wagons that the Romani habituated as the moved through the countryside and each carried a family. The Vardo were usually colorful and well taken care of but this caravan had fallen onto harder times. The colors were dim, the etchings were worn, and there was no music around the communal fire. They had lost a number of the familia on that day and not all to the violent Carpathians that accused one of the Roma as a witch.

The town was in ruins; corpses littered the street, torn to pieces by pieces of metal.

Some of those had been women and children taken from the caravan.

There was a girl who suffered more than most. She was a small thing, far too tall and far too thin for her age with long flowing raven hair. Her eyes were a dull jade and were hidden behind a pair of glasses with lenses too large for its frame. She looked miserable. She had lost her бака to the villager intent on burning her mother at the stake. The burned her while they beat her deda into a sleep he would not awaken from. The girl's mother and uncle had disappeared, as their bodies were not amongst the dead of the ruined town. There was little doubt that they had survived the massacre, after all, they were special.

But little Tayler was not. She was cold and alone in a land that hated her for the life she was born into without a grandmother to sing her stories, a grandfather to scare the scary monsters back into the night, an uncle that brought her food when the camp ran out, or a mother to clam her dream and sing her to sleep.

This was a hard day…

There would be many more like this to come.

-X-

When I next awoke I was no longer falling but my heart was beating as quick as lightning and as loud as thunder but even

In fact, I was resting on a firm, but not necessarily uncomfortable, four post bed. The room was dark but there were a few stray rays of light seeped in through the gaps between the curtains of the room's singular round window hanging. For a split second, I thought I was back in the old house and that everything that happened after that cold January day, when Skitter was born, was simply just a dream. That dad would be knocking on my door to tell me it was time to descend into back into hell… and I would have welcomed it.

"What was that?" I asked myself through heavy breaths. No matter how much of me was lost I knew that that vision wasn't part of my memories but it wasn't a hallucination.

But reality was often disappointing and that made me feel like…

…Every time Sophia tripped me on the stairs and the teachers gave me pitying looks…

…Every time Emma ruined a piece of mom's memory and I had to walk back to an empty house…

… Every time the Police claimed they were getting close to an arrest while I heard them snicker about what had happened to me…

…When you're standing in the surf, and you can feel the tide scouring the sand from under your feet and you imagine the moment when all the earth will be gone, and you will fall.

'Sigh.'

God, I reeked of angst.

The room was cluttered with trinkets that looked old enough to be antique, thick cobwebs connected each like a blanket. It would have almost been beautiful if I hadn't been so disturbed. Either every spider in the room was dead, which was quickly proven false when a harmless daddy longlegs crawled up my one remaining hand before skittering away when an involuntary spasm made it twitch, or Contessa's bullet wasn't meant to kill me as much as it was about stopping Khepri.

Which I could respect, hell I could accept it but didn't change the fact that she was responsible for putting me in a position where I had to choose between being Taylor and that thing. She had judged me worthy enough to spare, which meant that there was something inside of me that, despite everything that had to be done, that could still do some good.

Still, I held no delusions.

If I ever saw her again I would undoubtedly try to kill her.

"But she's not here now, my dear." A woman's voice whispered right above my ear. The best way to describe it would have been posh and there was an echo that gave it an ethereal almost ethereal quality to it. Flicking the arachnid of my one remaining wrist I turned to face the owner of the voice only to be greeted more antiques. Sliding off the bed I tried to move to the door but stopped when the voice spoke again.

"I must commend your instincts, young one." The voice chuckled from behind me. This time I turned far too quickly to keep my balance, tumbling into a large urn that was thankfully being supported by an even larger dresser. "You, unlike most, seem to have the good sense to retreat when dealing with beings far beyond your capabilities of handling… though your lack of grace could very well lead to your doom."

I bit my lip while trying to regain my footing. That last bit was definitely meant as an insult but for the life of me, I couldn't make myself rise to her provocation. There was something within me that was numbing my emotional responses to the point where my mind was actively trying to find a logical reason for the mysterious floating voice and trying to discern the most efficient method of killing it.

The first theory was that I was interacting with a stranger but that theory was quickly discarded because there were no strangers stupid enough to reveal themselves while trapped a confined space without holding a knife to my neck.

As Skitter, as Weaver, and as Khepri I had at least earned that precaution.

The next theory came in the form of a Master power, like mine or perhaps like Crusader's, but there was nothing there when I slipped off the bed and nothing there when I stumbled into the vase. A Tinker with a microphone made the most sense but the amount of usable scrap in this room either meant that I was wrong or there was someone with enough funds to feed their Tinker cravings and maintain their dusty collection of artifacts. Whichever way it was I was certain that I was fucked. My knife wouldn't do anything to a projection and a Tinker would have precautions if I acted out… my knife… that I had left on the bed.

And that was when things truly became strange.

The knife, as I called the busted up Scion killer, slid off the bed with startling speed, zoomed through the short distance between the mattress and I… and floated into my hand my left hand.

Correction: my one remaining hand.

"Perhaps I spoke too soon…" The voice murmured. There was a pause in which nothing happened followed by a shimmer that eventually formed into a humanoid figure that at moments resembled an old woman with Victorian-like way of dress and a flapper with a bob cut. There was an expression of sadness on her face in either form. Her body language was non-hostile and instead was presented in a way that made her seem open but I couldn't very well drop my guard, so the knife stayed in place. "Child, it will do you well to remember that there are things that a simple knife can't kill."

"I killed a god with this knife." My voice came out in a with a slight accent that I could not recognize, my tongue felt heavy as if it were speaking a language that it had never used before. My teeth felt strange too… what happened to me? "Who are you? What did you do to me?" It came out like a demand despite the rising fear that was cutting through my numbness.

"Agatha Harkness and I have done nothing." The projection of the raised a thin eyebrow and shot me look that said that she was not impressed. "What Earth did Wanda pull you from?" The old crone shook her head as if dispelling the question. "It matters little. What happened to you is as much a godsend as it is a tragedy, my dear. You fell through the veil between realities, stumbling onto a place few visit and even fewer return from."

It is strange not being able to push my emotions out of my head. At the time when I was stressed or facing situations where I needed to be focused if there was a to be any hope for survival, the swarm had always taken the brunt of it. Keeping me cool and calm but now… without my connection to my passenger, I couldn't stop myself from shaking.

"What happened to me?" My voice trembled when I asked.

Her features softened slightly but they still held the same regal severity as before. "Had you fallen on any other day Wanda would have pulled you from the gap with ease, taken you to the Avengers' mansion, and would have had the best doctors watching your recovery but you fell on a day unlike any other." She stopped talking flickering between her aristocratic and flapper forms while she looked for the right words to explain what had happened to me.

Finally, she closed her eyes and began to speak. "You must understand that Wanda didn't mean to cause you any harm and that even she is not aware of her actions." The woman looked sickened by the excuses she forced herself to tell but I could tell that it wasn't towards the woman she had mentioned and focused on herself. "There was a massacre earlier this where month sixteen million souls were murdered by man-made machines hoping to cleanse the world of people, whom due to no fault of their own, developed special abilities. These people are known as mutants by the populace and they are hated for simply being."

"What killed them?"

"Sentinels" With her declaration came pictures of colossal automata that looked like something straight out if an old comic book. They vaguely resembled humans but their features could be deemed cartoonish. "These machines with the sole purpose of slaughtering mutants. " Agatha continued without missing a beat and with a wave of her transparent hand, the lumbering machines were replaced by the image a striking man that carried himself like what heroes were supposed to be back home. There were wrinkles on his face but that only seemed to add to the regalness of his complexion. He wore a form-fitting suit that hugged his large muscles and a long billowing cape hung from his shoulder "Amongst them was a man who called himself Magneto. He fancied himself the messiah of mutant kind and would do anything in his incredible power to ensure his people's survival. Magneto was a survivor until today. He was a cruel old man set in his ways but he was Wanda's father and a part of her broke with the news of his death."

"What does Magneto have to do with me?" The longer she spoke the greater the sense of foreboding became. Despite my lack of information I couldn't help but draw parallels between this man and Contessa. Both fought for the survival of their people, and I didn't doubt that Magneto would commit the same atrocities that Contessa and her Cauldron committed if given half the chance.

"Everything. Like Magneto, Wanda's life has been marred by tragedy. When she was young Wanda lost her people due to the intolerances of the small-minded men. Her adoptive father was beaten into a coma her adoptive mother was burnt alive, and her clan was forced to break apart. When she was a grown woman she fought horrors that would have you quaking with your little dagger but she knew love and she learned loss and like Magneto she endured and like Magneto she began to splinter under the weight despite the best efforts of those around her. Magneto's death was a catalyst and you were caught in the crossfire of a poor girl's wish. The consequences of which…" She stopped as if to take a breath. "It would be best if you saw for yourself."

With a wave of her hand, the door behind me swung open to reveal a dark corridor. "There is a washroom at the end of the hall."

What does it say about my life that I believed her? Despite every betrayal and every broken promise, I believed the projection. There wasn't a reason for her to lie, she had every advantage, and some small part of me couldn't believe that Contessa would be so petty that she would take out my agent just to have me killed by someone else… but then again that was her modus operandi for people she couldn't see with her power.

Or maybe I was just tired.

There was a truth to everything that the projection had said but there was a caution in her voice that reminded me of a nameless friend trying to brace me for something terrible. Resigned to my fate, I staggered down the narrow hallway. There was an unnatural coldness to the short stretch between rooms. The air was stagnant and the darkness was so thick that I could barely see my two feet beneath me. To be completely honest I was half expecting some buzz saw to pop out of the wall and take my head but I knew there wasn't.

As my numbness faded my awareness expanded like a bubble until I could feel the pipes in the walls, the nails in the nearby supports, and the knife in my hand… a whole new world of senses were slowly awakening yet I couldn't focus on them with the looming fear at what this 'Wanda' had done to me.

The bathroom was sparsely decorated with bland white tiles on the floor and peeling yellow wallpaper. I saw a few roaches scattered about which was rather disorienting when I couldn't connect with them. There was a time when their feedback would have been gibberish but that had been before I dawned the cowl. I had grown to depend on their senses. It was somehow worse than losing me… at least my brain tricked itself into believing that it was still attached.

When I managed to pull my eyes away from the bugs loitering around the bathroom and confront my reflection I was… I don't really know how I was. My mind was suddenly flung into a maelstrom of emotion from which there was no escape. There was horror, of course, but there was also relief; joy but sadness; elation and despair. Tears flowed freely down my cheeks as unfamiliar green eyes stared back at me.

I was pretty, some would even say beautiful, and I looked enough like me that I could recognize myself but those parts were left to me by my dad. My eyes were a dark green before but now they appeared to be an almost sparkling jade and now had a more of an almond quality to them. My mouth was wide but proportionate to my face. My skin was blemishless and fair, every scar My hair was mostly the same… a bit worse for wear but I could still convince myself that it was still my mother's hair.

That lone feature was all that remained of my mother and I couldn't even be sure that it belonged to her.

It wasn't a complete surprise when I heard the knife clatter on the floor nor when the room began to spin and my vision became blurry. My heart was beating loudly and I could feel the blood rush to my head. Nausea and dizziness brought me to my knees. It wasn't long before I vomited up bile but by then I had regained enough strength to lean against the toilet.

"Why?" I asked the stone-faced projection with a croak. Despite the simplicity of the question, it was loaded.

'Why am I here?'

'Why did you change me?'

'Why can't I remember my mother's face anymore?'

'Why me?'

'Why couldn't you let me die?'

"'Sacrifices were made for Wanda's betterment. When she lost her sons to a demon and the foundations of her mind were about to give I wiped her memories of ever having conceived them." Her words were slow, as if trying to explain things to a child, and felt almost condescending because of how she delivered them. "When her witchcraft began to change the world around her I fabricated a lie so that those people she called friends did not come to fear her. Yet through it, all her desire for a family was stronger than any mind magic that could conjure and despite my best efforts she finally snapped." The projections façade broke into a look of regret for an instant before returning to the cold and seemingly uncaring mask she preferred to wear. "Seeing that history would repeat itself I intervened, I had felt a disturbance in the Witch's Road and guided Wanda, in all her madness, towards its source. I had hoped for a battle that would drain her long enough for insanity to pass yet there were no monsters threating our source of power, no greedy warlocks, or interdimensional conquerors… just a broken girl in a suit and a knife."

If it had been anyone else who threw me into oblivion I would have chalked it up to bad luck but with Contessa everything was done by design. There was a reason for everything she did… she wanted me to abandon everything I was and become something new. This Wanda seemed an apt instrument for Contessa's plans.

She knew this would happen but that didn't answer me why.

"In a moment of lucidity she wanted to carry you back to her friends but all that changed when she laid a hand on you and heard you whimper. Lucidity gave way to obsession. With her magic, she changed your blood to include her and by extension her father. Your past was altered to fit this reality and you became the daughter she and her brother forgot about when they were taken by their father. Despite this, there were things she could not alter despite being in the nexus of all witchcraft. There is something Cosmic within you that she shut down but could not expel…"

She continued to drone but I couldn't honestly say that I was listening or even pretending to do so… yet there I stayed. Muffled sobs were drowned out by the projection's voice.

-X-

Her grandfather had gone mad.

When he awoke he didn't see little Tayler or grandmother. Django would speak as if she weren't there. He would talk to the neighbors and with those outsiders. He harped about the death of his wife and granddaughter to any unfortunate soul that would listen. They would call him a drunk when little Tayler would eventually show up and drag him away before the local guard arrested him for selling his wares. Django no longer sang near the fire or dance at few feasts. All he did was play with his puppets and mumble about aunt Ana and uncle Mateo, both died years before her mama had given birth to the youngest Maximoff.

Her grandmother had been burned with their old Vardo yet she survived. Her skin was reddish and every other motion made her groan in pain. With every night that passed that her mama and her uncle Pietro didn't return little Tayler watched her grandmother's heartbreak. Without Django to support them life was hard but not as hard as it could have been. Tayler was forced to grow too young much to her grandmother's regret but as the years passed it became a necessity. They could never stay in one place for long because Drobnjak, a local priest would travel to whatever town they were visiting and incite problems with the townsfolk. When that happened they tended to go north towards Latveria to seek shelter amongst a friendly clan of Rom. One day her grandfather did not return to their new wagon. It happened in a bleak midwinter night; he disappeared to the cursed mountain Wundagor, never to be heard from again.

That same year something wonderful occurred. Her mama and uncle Pietro were alive and they were heroes! Her mama was the Scarlet Witch and her Uncle was Quicksilver. They lived in a mansion in America! They fought alongside a plethora of heroes and Tayler collected every newspaper clipping she could get her hands on. Those early days of their heroics had inspired dreams that one day her mama would descend from the heavens and hug her but just before she could wrap her in a warm embrace uncle Pietro would scoop her away like he used to.

Needless to say, they never came yet Tayler didn't stop calling Wanda mama until she found a picture of the Scarlet Witch with her husband and their children years after first hearing her mother's heroic exploits. Despite her grandmother's comforting words the feeling that she had been replaced… that her mother had never bothered to look for her because she wanted a life without the mistake that she represented grew exponentially. She began to make plans to face her mother but she grew sick soon after. They called it the Legacy Virus and it awoke her family's own legacy that she had been ignorant of.

She survived the illness and recuperated just in time to see Magneto declaring war on the world. Many heroes that decried him but there was only one she listened to. Captain America said the Avengers would not strike against Magneto before the ruler actually attacked despite his strong feelings on the man he called a tyrant.

Yet Tayler knew that this could be her last chance to confront the woman that gave birth to her. So she left like her grandfather before her, without a word or a note.

A new world greeted her.

-X-

A/N: Hello and welcome to Legacy of M! Now I know that there are a few of you that are caught up with Marvel and know about the latest retcon that Quicksilver and Scarlet Witch aren't actually related to Magneto, so logically there is no way that Taylor would inherit Magneto's mutation. The answer to this is rather simple really. Wanda's reality warping powers shape the world, as she subconsciously believes it to be true or how she wants it to be. Thus when she 'creates' Tayler.

Now I know that Wanda and Pietro don't have a good relationship with Magneto but they would miss him if he were to die. In 2001 Grant Morrison's run of X-Men destroyed the island nation of Genosha but there wasn't much of a reaction from the rest of the heroes that I could find. So I decided to play a bit with Scarlet Witch's descent into madness which leads into Avengers: Disassembled and starts House of M.

Sorry that most of this chapter was mostly exposition but it is necessary for the next bit Taylor doesn't know anything about the new world around her and barely grasps what happening to her.

please leave a comment!

thank you!

 

[Lotor]

Daaaamn nice. Reposting here? Good! Looking forward to rereading it.

Looking forward to seeing more, as ever. Love this story in particular.

 

[Storm0fcrows]

Daaaamn nice. Reposting here? Good! Looking forward to rereading it.

Looking forward to seeing more, as ever. Love this story in particular.

Click to shrink...

Pretty much, I'm working on the next chapter right now and thought I should start porting stuff over here.

 

[Hrozne]

This is actually one of my favorite x-over fictions. I enjoy a lot of people's takes on Post-GM Taylor and this one seemed to check a lot of the boxes that I liked. Happy to at least see it getting reposted and potentially continued.

 

[Dwight Varela]

Oh Wanda, what have you done.

Note: I've already read this story but I'm going to comment like each chapter is brand new to me cuz I didn't start reading until two chapters from where it currently is.

 

[Lazily]

I am glad that this story is continuing, even partially. I am a huge fan of this fic.

 

[ioriangel]

I am glad you are back, though the only problem I have with this story is the pacing. Like how you had broken the fight with Carol Danvers into multiple unnecessary chapters.

 

[Night Hunter]

There is a bright side of this whole mess for Taylor. She no longer has the shard in her head messing with her personality.

Shards altered they hosts to propagate conflict in subtle to obvious ways. It is implied that Taylor by the Timeskip was becoming too cold and pragmatical to the point tshe was worried how much was of her thoughts were untainted.

Wonder how far she will go now that she can no longer stomoch her self-justications and try to ignore the wrongdoings around her as she did as Weaver. Also that she no longer can use bugs to channel her emotions.

 

[Storm0fcrows]

ReGenesis 1.2

-X-

Hours passed as I rested on the filthy tiles, yet the projection that called herself Agatha still lingered. I sat there motionlessly, but that didn't mean that I was idle. It wasn't hard to deduce what my new power was after hearing the projection claim that they were based off a guy that called himself Magneto. I could feel metal, and I can apparently call it towards me, and maybe I can push it away, but I didn't have the strength to.

I was weary, and because of that, I could barely lift the knife with either my hand or this new power of mine. How long had it been since I had eaten or drank a glass of water? How much time had passed since Scion was stopped and I was betrayed?

…

Was I betrayed, or was I the betrayer?

My memories weren't clear. It was all just so muddled together that I couldn't sift through the gunk.

It was a struggle to get off my feet. I swayed a few times, but by shifting my weight, I managed to counter long enough to support myself against the wall. Exiting the bathroom was another odyssey in itself. My legs had fallen asleep, so I was walking on pins and needles with every step I took. Agatha followed hovered over my shoulder, giving me a look that reminded me of a nameless crone behind a large wooden desk back on my Earth.

If I ever assumed that the structure I was in was a house, I would blame it on temporary delirium. It was a mansion divided into at least four wings. Naturally, I moved to the room with the most metal within it and where the most pipes led.

"You won't find any food in the kitchens." The projection warned. A cold chill ran over me as the projection passed over me and made to black me. "What you will find there you are not prepared for."

Again, I knew she was telling the truth, but my body shambled on. Judging by the state of the house around me whatever the owner of this mansion whatever they had that wasn't canned would be spoiled, and there were no cans to speak of in the entirety of the estate. The corridors were dark, took senselessly sharp turns, and had unexpected slants that made traversing the mansion hazardous for my tired legs. I slipped a handful times but mostly managed to catch myself before I got the point where I wouldn't be getting back up.

After the long walk, I found my self in the kitchen face to face with a charred corpse sitting next to the stove. I think it spoke volumes of my past experience that I didn't react to it. There were enough dead in my past to fill a mass grave… this one didn't even scratch the top ten most horrible things I had seen in the past week. Well, I think it's been a week. For the time being, I'll chuck it up as one of the many issues that came with interdimensional travel. Side effects may include but not limited to nausea, dizziness, memory loss, muscle atrophy, a small chance that some crazy witch will play god. Good thing that the body didn't stink.

I felt what I was looking before I had even stepped out of the bathroom. It was indeed fortunate that the steel teakettle was next to an extraordinary collection of dried leaves; at least half of them were used for tea. The other half included labels like Belladonna, Wolfsbane, and Deadly Nightshade, all written in neat cursive on yellowing paper.

I reached out for the teakettle, with my right hand, while shooting the dried up corpse a cautionary glance. There was something off about. There weren't any signs of decomposition, no smell, no rot, and no bugs.

It worried me.

… but not as much as the fucking teakettle's handle that I was somehow missing! My glare and promises of impending my wrath died as I watched my useless stump wave about as if my hand were still attached. Agatha didn't snicker or smirk her eyes; instead, she looked at me as weary cat eyeing a potentially dangerous prey.

Twelve minutes later, half of which was spent looking for matches to ignite the antique gas stove, I was sipping a cup of a bitter, black liquid while staring at the scowling projection. Agatha wasn't at the forefront of my mind despite practically glaring at her. There was a whole new world beyond these adorned walls. They didn't know Skitter, Weaver, or Khepri. There were no biases against me, but there were dangers to being an unknown. Reputation was a deterrent, puffing my chest and looking menacing acquired extra weight when the opponent knew that I could amass and control a biblical swarm.

On this world… they couldn't even spell my name right.

But too much strength brought challengers out of the shadows and with them came conflict. Life was a balancing act, and history proved that I sucked at it.

First, I needed information about this world. Earth Bet had rules to preserve cape lives, but the fact that some Tinker had created robots made specifically for genocide didn't fill me with confidence that this Earth had similar values. There probably weren't any Endbringers to unite the populace or a PR machine to make a new generation of potential heroes be loved. I needed the big names and how to avoid them best. When I had all that then I could start thinking about getting back to the Bay.


…



…



'Shit.'


There was no going back to the Bay, was there? Who can say that there wasn't a Taylor Hebert living her life peacefully along with her Mother and Father? What would I say? What trouble would I bring to that innocent girl's door? Biologically, I wasn't the same Taylor. I would be Danny Hebert's bastard daughter! Evidence that he had cheated on mom with some Gipsy.

I would ruin their lives for a moment of comfort.

The cup in my hand shook at the realization, but still, I continued to drink and gather myself.

Where would I go where 'Wanda' couldn't find me?

"Are we in the United States?" I asked the projection, and once again, my new accent caught me by surprise. My words are clumsy but not enough to impair my ability to converse.

"Yes." She confirmed with unnecessary finality. I waited for her to expand, but the old crone simply floated in place and stared. "But how will knowing where you are help you, my dear? Wanda may have created an identity for you in this world, but that doesn't mean that you have resources to your name. You will find moving around to be quite tricky when you lack currency or reputation."

"Where?" I asked once again but more forcefully.

"Whisper Hill, New York." Good news: I was in New York, relatively close to New England. Bad news: I didn't have the slightest clue where Whisper Hill was or how to get to more familiar ground. A map would be an invaluable resource, but that could wait until I had somewhere to go and how to get there.


New York wasn't as bad as it could have been. Boston was what? Five, maybe six, hours away by train? How much would a ticket cost? Would Wanda expect me to travel back to the place I felt safest? Logic made me want to go back to the Bay despite my worries that I would ruin my possible alternates life, but logic is predictable… which made it

If I wanted to get away, I needed to think outside the box.

"You are not the same person you were before Wanda dragged you into your new reality." Agatha interrupted my thoughts with casual ease. "Chances are that you were never meant to be born onto this Earth, and the place that was once home will never be home again." Her nearly glassy eyes were locked onto mine, making me feel the sheer intensity of her gaze. "If you try to live in the past, all you will find is suffering."

'Home is behind, the world ahead, my Little Owl.' A wisp of memory sang in my mother's voice. Tolkien was one of mom's favorites. She loved the complexity of the story and the beautiful message that it carried. I hadn't appreciated it back then, not as I should have, but I guess that's what makes the words hold more value now than they once did. "What do you suggest I do then?"

"There isn't a place on this Earth where Wanda will not find you." As she spoke, the projection's image flickered and changed. Color slowly spread throughout her form until she became flesh and blood. The expression on her face gradually shifted from mild discomfort to annoyance. A quick sidelong glance at where the dried corpse once stood revealed that it was no longer there and the projection was now wholly human. Agatha's scowl deepened, but with a shake of her head, she continued. "She is the Nexus Being of this reality, she keeps this universe stable, and you are now paramount to her own stability. If I had the power, I would keep you locked away before the forces of Darkness caught the scent of your existence, but I do not. As such, my suggestion is for you to go to the densest, most populated city and fade into the crowd, at least then you'll make her search difficult."

Was it a time limit that made Agatha become corporal, or was she trapped in a time loop? Because that corpse was real enough that it had fooled me. Powers were bullshit, but there was a certain practicality to them. What was the point of becoming a ghost that couldn't interact with the rest of the world if she couldn't control when she came out of it-

It was then that whatever speculations I had about Agatha were thrown into a maelstrom with a wave of her hand. My aches and exhaustion disappeared. I felt new and better than I had in years.

I would like to reiterate for that powers are Bullshit! What did healing have to do with turning into a ghost! I was about to voice my question when Agatha stood up with shaky feet, looking nearly a decade older, and held up a hand literally silencing me.

"Go to the back the bathroom and take a shower." Agatha pushed taking away my nearly full cup. "I will have a bag and transportation ready for when you come out."

-X-

Tayler was never going to be the prima ballerina, not that that she had any real desire to do so, but some benefits could not be ignored. So when she danced on the freshly polished stage surrounded by girls that shared both her talent for dance and lived in the same desperate situation, it was essential to be the best. It was easier to travel to America if the audience loved you… if the Spider loved you.

When she left the scant protection of her caravan, many Rom had guided her towards the woman known only as the Spider. She was a smuggler and a cruel woman, but she was of the same Tribe and thus was duty bound to help the wayward souls that wandered blindly into her parlor. The Spider was old and grey but still held the majesty of a woman half her age and born into nobility. She had been beautiful once, the older girls used to say, she used to be a favorite to the former king Latveria before Doom's revolution. The new king in his castle above Doomstadt had no patience for those that he had no use for, and thus the Rom dancer became a spymaster… or at least that what they used to whisper when the matron's back was turned.


The boys were made into fighters, useful to the men that would hire them once they came to America. Brutal, efficient, and willing to do whatever their masters wanted of them.


It was not so simple for the girls. There were a plethora of jobs for pretty, talented girls that had nowhere to go. Most made Tayler's stomach churn, which was why she gave dancing her all. The fluidity of motion came naturally. Grace was easy to mimic, but precision was a challenge that Tayler did not take well. The music and dance of her caravan were chaotic and free, but the shows that the Spider put together were too restricting. Every step was counted, and every motion consciously measured. There was no freedom under the Spider's web but.


Nadia Trovaya basked in the spotlight like a glass swan. What Tayler lacked she had in spades despite being at least two years younger. She was the Spiders favorite, and somehow, the girl had wormed her way into the black-haired mutant's hardened heart. Nadia was bubbly despite the circumstances. She believed them to be friends though that was something Tayler hesitated to call the younger girl that.

There was something seriously wrong with the girl. Nadia's eyes didn't light up when she smiled or laughed. Her laughter was always either too long to be comfortable or too short of having found any real humor, and it seemed more practiced instead of natural. Her moods seemed to shift between bouts of cartoonish joy and hours of calculating silence, yet neither one affected how she moved nor the mask she wore in front of the Spider.


Still, the girl latched onto Tayler, even when the Legacy virus made her powers lash out.


That was the only time she saw a genuine smile from Nadia and with it came the secret.


A secret that Tayler would have preferred not knowing.


Because there was something terrible about sympathy when you were trapped in a perilous position.


"Have I ever told you about my parents?" Nadia whispered in English as I suffered through cold sweats. A smile tugged her lips while she ran a wet cloth over my forehead. "My parents were both scientists, but my father is a hero. He was one of the first of the Avengers and the greatest mind on the planet, but he made enemies. One night, they stole her away and I was born into a cage.They called that cage The Red Room… "

-X-

A/N

OK. Into the chapter: not much here except a bit more back story for Taylor's new past and establishing a plan for the future, namely, New York where many of our favorite heroes inhabit at this point in time.


Now here are some questions that I'm sure some of you are asking that don't spoil anything:


Q: Why doesn't Agatha keep Taylor in her mansion?


A: Because there are a handful of people who still visit her. Fantastic Four and The Scarlet Witch being the main ones. If the Fantastic Four decide to shelter her Victor Von Doom finds out about her and the Wanda is liable to kill Taylor in her mania as she has Agatha… and wouldn't that be a can of Worms…

'Wink'

Yes. Bad pun and I should feel bad.


Q: Why the hell are you including the new Wasp now? She doesn't escape from the Red Room for years!


A: One: because I like her character and her back story is pretty interesting and mirrors Taylor's new past to an extent. Two: I think Marvel missed the mark with this fascinating character. She could have been something amazing on the level of Jessica Jones (the comic book but the show is good too) but they made her too fluffy. Fingers crossed for an Unstoppable Wasp MAX. Three: The Red Room or Black Widow OPS has been shut down since before 2004 in Earth 616. We can see this in Black Widow 2004-2005 when the successor to the Red Room is trying to wipe out all the Widows and again in the 2015 run where we see a former Widow trying to establish a new Black Ops agency code name "Black Room" which means that Nadia was either created due to the Incursion ( which is… whatever) or she's been floating about gathering her courage to approach her father.



Now I know that I'm trying to draw logic from a sliding timeline. But I find it impossible that this girl isn't in the same age group as the Runaways instead of high school of Miss Marvel. Where did I get that idea? Mostly because Janet and Pym were married for years in universe. So Nadia would be early twenties at the point they introduced her if they wanted to use the red room angle.



There I defended the K-G-Bee.



…



I do apologize for that pun. A friend of mine bet me that I wouldn't do it.



Well that's it.



Next Time: The U-Men.

 

[Westcoast-Quilin]

"You, unlike most, seem to have the good sense to retreat when dealing with beings far beyond your capabilities of handling… though your lack of grace could very well lead to your doom."

Click to shrink...

Hahaha! I laugh in your face. Taylor retreat? Good sense? You obviously don't know our Lady of Escalation, Patron Saint of No Restraint.

 

[Simonbob]

Hahaha! I laugh in your face. Taylor retreat? Good sense? You obviously don't know our Lady of Escalation, Patron Saint of No Restraint.

Click to shrink...

Don't be silly.

Taylor's entirely willing to retreat. Unless there's something important enough to fight for, of course. Then? Well, Endbringers, the Nine, Echidna, and the end of Worlds, being ripped in half, none of that's enough.

 

[Lazily]

Things are getting interesting after all.